Tag Archives: imperfect

So, I found instructions on Pinterest for no-recipe biscuits, and felt inspired (thank you, Posie Harwood – http://food52.com/blog/10148-how-to-make-yogurt-biscuits-without-a-recipe). It involves dumping unmeasured amounts of flour, baking powder and glops of yogurt in a bowl and mixing them together, and then adding whatever else you like – I love that! It also had rolling and cutting biscuits, which seemed to be more work than I was interested in. So instead, I just dolloped the biscuits onto the baking pan to see how they’d go. They are certainly not picture-perfect-Martha-Stewart biscuits, but I’m not exactly a picture-perfect-Martha-Stewart chef, so it all works out okay in the end.

Here is my adaptation of the recipe, in two versions – Maple-Bacon and Feta-Green Onion:

In a big bowl… Start with as much flour as you would like biscuits. Take your baking powder and pour in a lil’ shake of it, and then take your salt and pepper shaker and give two shakes of salt. Mix up these ingredients and wiggle a little while you do. (You don’t actually have to wiggle, it just makes this more fun).

Now, take a big thing of yogurt – I like vanilla, even for savory biscuits – and let a good sized glop or two fall in. Mix this stuff up and add some milk too, until it is thick and gloppy but not quite runny like pancake mix (if this happens, add more flour). See the above Food52 website for pictures of what the consistency should look like.

For MAPLE-BACON (aka. Breakfast-in-a-Biscuit):

-Cook up some bacon beforehand. You can use leftovers from brunch, or if you haven’t had brunch today, bake it in the oven. If you have extra bacon grease – pour a little in to your biscuit mixture to add flavor.

-Add a healthy pour of maple syrup.

-Crumble up bacon into little bits – more than you think you’d need.

-Mix it all together!

For FETA-GREEN ONION:

-Pour in as much feta as you’d like. Feta is great because as it cooks in the biscuits, it creates little air pockets that are delicious when you eat them!

-Add chopped little green onions.

-Add a handful of cheddar cheese, too, if you’d like.

-Add in a little oregano, garlic powder and fresh basil.

-Mix mix mix.

Then, drop the mixture onto baking pans or cookie sheets – I use two spoons and drop as much mixture as I would cookie dough. Bake at 400 for 10-12 minutes.

Every year for Lent, Christians find something to “give up.” For many, this is a second chance at a New Year’s Resolution, like giving up chocolate for the 40 days. Over the past few years, I’ve tried to use this time as an opportunity not to give something up, but rather to add something in. I’ve written in gratitude journals, tried to say nice things to others, and some of these have stuck even past Easter Sunday.

This year, I took on a bit of a bigger challenge. I vowed to do something every day to appreciate my body. This may sound a bit weird or simple, but it is really, really hard. How many times a day do we think, “oh, my ____ is aching,” or, “if I lost a couple of pounds right here…” with the implication that then we would be love-able, or perfect, or even just acceptable?

Especially with a condition like food allergies, it can be very difficult at times to express love and positive feeling towards myself. After an allergic reaction, I find it especially difficult to love myself and not feel betrayed by or angry towards my body.

But when we think negatively towards our body, it is near impossible not to think negatively about ourselves as a whole. We’re not thinking, “if I lost those two pounds my body would be so much better, but my mind is already wonderful.” (If you do think this, kudos to you). We generalize, and it is hard not to internalize the negativity we direct towards ourselves.

So, for Lent this year, I decided to try to raise my awareness of what I’m saying and feeling about my body, and where possible, do something every day to appreciate the body I have. To get a little religious on you – I believe this body I have is a gift from God, so I wanted to use Lent to appreciate it a little more.

Every day, I either worked out, did 10 minutes of yoga, or wrote in a journal something that I appreciated about my body. It was much more difficult than I expected, and some days, I’ll admit, I let it slip. Some days I was not pleased with my body, and the best I could do was think about how thankful I was for this body that was able to run around after my 2 year old niece earlier in the day.

I have not learned to love all my imperfections in 40 days. But, I did raise my awareness and realize the times when I am most hard on myself, and when I might need a little bit more compassion for my body (after a reaction is one of those times). I also realized that when I work out, when I go to bed early and when I put good food into my body, the appreciation grows. I’m imperfect, and so are you, and that’s okay.

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